One Way To Improve The Country: Improve The Electorate

Have you seen the Britney Spears act lately?  It's quite a show.  A cross between a train wreck and a monkey procreating with with football.  You don't want to look, but you must.

The point?

I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of American's are more familiar with Brit's daily trips to crazy town than they are with anything going on in the current political news cycle.  Is that surprising?  Unfortunately, less so every year.

What makes this situation so disturbing is that these political illiterates are provided with the same right to the ballot box as an informed voter.  The fact that they're clueless as to whom or what they're voting for is totally irrelevant.  This is certainly nothing new, but the idiot pool is clearly expanding exponentially on an annual basis.

It's a fact that the best friend of a Democrat candidate is an uninformed voter.  A political simpleton is far more likely to pull D than R (sorry libs - sad but true).  The more people know about the issues, the more likely they are to vote on the right side of the spectrum.  That being the case, many on the left enjoy the status quo and aren't anxious to make any adjustments.

Consider the fact that you must be tested and proven competent before you're approved to do any of the following:

• Massage therapist
• School teacher
• Auto mechanic
• Pharma Rep
• Cab driver

The list could go on, but you get the point.  We test for proficiency in any number of endeavors, but when it comes to a persons competency to select our nations leader's, it's come one dumbass, come all.  Think about the absurdity of this.  Did we really ask men to lay down their lives to give people of this ilk a vote?  Doesn't it bring dishonor to their personal sacrifice to do so?

If you can't take 15 minutes to do a cursory review of the candidates and issues, you don't deserve the right to vote.  PERIOD.  But how do you determine who is qualified and who is not?  Simple.  You create a Voter Competency Exam that would be taken by each person prior to their vote (online or at the polling station).  If you can't name the major candidates in a race, their party affiliation and the primary issues on the ballot, you lose your right to vote.

Is that too harsh?  I don't think so.  It's time people are held accountable for their wanton stupidity.  Too many in this society seem to wear it like a badge of honor.  They take pride in foolish, irresponsible behavior (Paris, Britney, Lohan).  Providing ignorance of that sort a voice within our electoral system, in always increasing numbers, will eventually destroy this country from within.

The right to vote is the most sacred right we have as Americans.  If you're too dense, lazy or irresponsible to take a few minutes to prepare yourself, then I would suggest you be swiftly removed from the voter pool.

And our country would reap the rewards of an informed electorate - and likely move sharply to the right.

Comments

[Mark]

Here's the early 20th Theodore Roosevelt appointed Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes' solution:

"Even the United States Supreme Court endorsed aspects of eugenics. In its infamous 1927 decision, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote, "It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind…. Three generations of imbeciles are enough." This decision opened the floodgates for thousands to be coercively sterilized or otherwise persecuted as subhuman. Years later, the Nazis at the Nuremberg trials quoted Holmes's words in their own defense."

I was looking up information on eugenics for something completely different, come to your site (as it seems I a new loyal liberal reader), saw you had some new stuff, and thought it might fit. Actually, it fits marginally to the discussion. But the philosophy was that the stupid, incompetent, etc shouldn't be able to breed. Hence, America had a eugenics policy (that was practiced) prior to Nazi Germany.

The problem with most people being ill informed is apathy and cynicism. It doesn't necessarily mean that voters are stupid, per se; it has more to do with us not seeing the difference between the two parties. The media doesn't really inform us on the issues, objective journalism doesn't exist on the right or left. And political races have become a cult of personality. The problem of the American electorate is far more complex than you portray. One final thought for the night (Alaska is 1 hour behind Pacific time, 4 hours from EST):

THE PEOPLE THAT YOU ARE RAILING AGAINST DON'T VOTE. I'll repeat myself unnecessarily - STUPID PEOPLE DON'T USUALLY REGISTER TO VOTE, THEY DON'T VOTE IN PRIMARIES (a better indication of performing your civic duty than voting in the general election), AND THEY DON'T VOTE IN THE GENERAL ELECTION. Sorry for the cap lock, just my "screaming" the point home.

[Mark]

Rereading what I just wrote, I need to clarify a point. How I got from voter tests to eugenics. Stripping a person of the franchise because you perceive them not to be competent enough to participate in the political process can lead you to ever slippery thinking such as "they should breed either." Quite a stretch, yes, but since I was thinking about the issue of eugenics and it just seemed to fit. There may be no real logic in it, I'll be the first to concede, but that's the kind of thought that led the eugenicists to eugenics in the first place. History is a record of what people have done and what they are often going to do again.

[USA Conservative]

Mark,

Stupid is a relative term. Informed may be more apt, but the bottom-line is if they don't know the basics of who is running and what the issues are, why should we let them cancel out the vote of an educated voter? My point is we shouldn't.

Concerning your point that the people I'm am railing against don't vote, on a per capita basis they may vote in smaller numbers, but as we see in Florida 2000, it doesn't take a huge number of votes to swing an election. That being said, this post is written on the principal that the ill-informed have not earned the right to vote, not a blueprint for how conservatives could win more elections (though that would be a welcome byproduct).

In short, voting would no longer be a right bestowed on you when you reach the age 18. It would be a right that you earn at election time by proving that your voice is worthy to join the pool of knowledgeable, civically responsible voters.

[A.L.]

Honestly, I don't know if people could ever "earn" the right to vote. Sounds good but most want a quick fix. I mean who has time to investigate everything? I know the issues...at least most of them...but I'm a news-obsessed junkie.

The average mom, and I'll use mom's as an example because I have two kids, are generally overworked, over car-pooled, and under-appreciated. That stuff breeds apathy. For example, what do I do at night when I've picked up my last kid from an activity? Go through the drive-thru at McDonald's for dinner. The kids like it, it's cheap, and everybody's happy. Is it the best for them? Apparently not because a guy sued McDonald's and won because it made him fat. But you know what, it sure did taste good going down.

Unfortunately, in this country, the quest for the "quick fix" has bred a multitude of problems. People try to be informed, they don't have time, so they just go to those they think they can trust. I mean, if "Oprah" says he's good...then darn it, he must be good? Right? Please know I'm being facitious here because I'm as Republican as they come. But I think, a lot of what happens with women voters is lack of time to investigate issues.

What can be done to help? Why don't you take the two guys that are duking it out right now...McCain and Romney...and size up foreign affairs, the economy, and healthcare. I will glady circulate it around to my address book and get the "word" out.

[Tim]

(chiming in 7 months later ...)

I think it would be more useful if politicians and all public employees (from DMV workers to cops to military enlistees) be tested on the U.S. Constitution.

Unfortunately, George W Bush would not have passed either test, and I think that of our current pres contenders, Obama would kick McCain's ass in the Constitution test. Let's see, 1st percentile or 96th .... Decades in the Senate don't make you intelligent, or sane, and certainly not ethical or steadfast in convictions.